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Circle of Life July 11, 2012

I was planning on posting my regular Wednesday price matching and meal plan, but it has been a week.

On Monday, Brian started his first interferon infusion treatment. He got chilled and started shaking and had a headache. They gave him some medicine to stop shaking and I had to drive him home.

A dear friend also had her baby by c-section at 7am in the morning. I went to the hospital to see them and I got to hold him for a little while. I started patting him bottom and swaying with him. Do you do that? I can’t help it when I hold babies. They were both beautiful.

Another dear friend, who was not due until the end of the month, went into labor. She delivered monday night around 7pm. She had a health baby girl. The funny thing is, both of these women are in my book club and they had their babies on the same day 12 hours apart!

I also got a call that another friend from church lost her husband Monday morning. He had been battling thyroid cancer and went home to the Lord Monday morning.

Monday, I felt like a call center between phone calls and texts it was nuts! I did have time to throw some chicken sausages on the grill, roast some potato slices and saute brussels sprouts with bacon and walnuts.

So on Tuesday, I drove my Mother-in-Law down to the oncologists office to she could sit with Brian and see what they all did (she is a nurse). I talked with my friends who had their new babies, ran to the store, and picked up my library card (yes, we have been here over a year and I am just getting one now). I ran back home to make Southwest eggrolls, guacamole, and corn chowder. Brian did better, they pre-hydrated him, then slowed the infusion time down and post-hydrated him. No shakes. But still chills, sweats and aches.

Today, I took my Father-in-Law to a yin yoga class, and then headed to the funeral for my husband’s friend. This afternoon we took the kids over to the mall to play for a little while and then came home to have pasta in mozzarella sauce and topped with a Bolognese. Again Brian seemed ok again today, same symptoms.

It’s been an emotional three days this week and I was thinking back over our wedding vows. Our anniversary is in a week and the same flew by. But the vows have been ringing through my head the past few months:

I, Amy, take you, Brian, to be my lawfully wedded husband, my constant friend, my faithful partner and my love from this day forward. In the presence of God, our family and friends, I offer you my solemn vow to be your faithful partner in sickness and in health, in good times and in bad, and in joy as well as in sorrow. I promise to love you unconditionally, to support you in your goals, to honor and respect you, to laugh with you and cry with you, and to cherish you for as long as we both shall live.

Here we are 12 years later and we have had joys (births of children, buying a home), we have had sorrows (friends divorce, friends lose spouses), been healthy (hiked in Glacier National Park, canoed in Alaska), we have been through sickness (MS, cancer). I took those vows seriously, but I don’t think I seriously considered how they would play out. This week showed me a full circle. And I know that this too shall pass. The sun rises and sets and the days come and go faster than we may want. Nowhere does it say that life will be easy, but it is full of riches if we choose to see them.